Patrick Wayne Kearney, a.k.a. "The Trash Bag Killer", is a prolific American necrophiliacserial killer and one of the three killers who were believed to be a single serial killer, "The Freeway Killer".

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Born in East Los Angeles, California, Kearney was the oldest of three sons and raised in a stable family. However, because of his appearance, he was a victim of bullying at a young age. As a teenager, Kearney started to fantasize about killing people. He lived in Texas for a short time and eventually moved back to California, where he worked as an engineer for the Hughes Aircraft Company. In his personal life, Kearney was a skilled gay pickup artist and fluent in Spanish, attributes that would later help him during his murders. After moving to Redondo Beach, he met with a man named David Hill and they eventually became lovers. Kearney would go out for long solitary drives after having arguments with Hill. During these drives, he would pick up male hitchhikers or homosexual men from gay bars.

Kearney's first known murder victim was an unidentified 19-year-old man in 1962; he took him to a secluded area on his motorcycle and shot him in the head before engaging in acts of necrophilia with the man's corpse. He proceeded to kill many more victims in the next several years. The investigation dubbed him not only "The Trash Bag Killer", but also "The Freeway Killer", a name shared by two other killers, William Bonin and Randy Kraft (see below). Days later, the remains of a victim murdered by Kearney were found and police discovered that he was last seen with Kearney and Hill. Both fled to El Paso, Texas, but were arrested after their families convinced them to turn themselves in. Hill was released after it was deduced that he had no involvement in the murders. Kearney confessed to 38 murders, but was charged with 21 counts of murders. Police believe that he may be responsible for even more murders. Kearney pleaded guilty and subsequently avoided a death sentence. He is now incarcerated at California State Prison.

Kearney would mainly pick up male hitchhikers or homosexual men from gay bars and shoot them, usually in the temple, above the ear, with a .22-caliber derringer. Most of the victims were killed while asleep or distracted. After murdering them, he would take the bodies to a secluded place and engage in acts of necrophilia, then take them home, where they would be sodomized with X-Acto knives. They were then mutilated and dismembered with hacksaws. As a forensic contermeasure, he would sometimes extract the bullets from their heads and then dispose of the bodies in canyons, landfills, and along the freeways, usually in trash bags, earning him his current nickname.

Alternatively, Kearney would take the bodies to the desert to be eaten by animals. He would also drain his victims' blood to eliminate odors and sometimes even bathe the dismembered body parts to minimize the blood and eliminate fingerprint evidence. Kearney would sometimes beat his victims' bodies to get a sensation of power over them and also to suppress his anger. Additionally, some of his victims resembled bullies from his childhood and adolescence. With his younger victims, Kearney smothered them and then dismembered their bodies, just like he did with his older victims.

In the Season Eight episode Broken, the scenario of Paul Westin and Mitchell Ruiz fleeing after Mitchell found out about Paul's murders is very similar to how Kearney and Hill fled to El Paso after police found the remains of a victim.